"This is Lakoda, who will be assisting me."

T'rend bowed gallantly, "Pleased to meet you."

"Let's get started." D'ssarian said leading the way back to surgery.

"I must go to the dining hall and get bait for the creature." Said T'rend.

"You won't need it," said Lakoda. "I assure you the creature will be quite
incapacitated."

T'rend laughed, "It's not that I don't trust your word, m'lady. But I've
never seen an incapacitated wraith, and I'd just feel better if we were
prepared."

"Suit yourself, T'rend." Said D'ssarian, "But please hurry. We begin in 
15 minutes. With or without you."

It didn't take Koda long to prepare the potion once D'ssarian showed 
her to a room where she could work. Along with the Tejas bulbs she'd
retrieved from the pack strapped to Ribbon, she had also retrieved a 
the small leather pouch containing the surgical knives and tools her 
father had given her the day Koda had aced her finally grades.

D'ssarian had asked that she assist him while he performed the surgery, 
but in all her years of training, Koda had learned to always be prepared. If
anything went wrong and for some reason D'ssarian was unable to 
continue as the lead surgeon, she would have to be ready to take over. 
In the unlikely event it happened, she wanted to have her own tools of 
her trade ready and at hand.

So on a tray set off to the side, out of the way, Koda arranged her
instruments, then reached inside her bag and pulled out one of the small red
bulbs she would need and started cutting it up into tiny pieces then picking
up a stone mortar, she smashed the pieces into a pulp.

The water she had set on the heat had come to a boil by the time the mixture
was finished, so pouring water over the top and setting it down 
to seep for five minutes. When the time was up, she strained the liquid into
a clean glass and went to find D'ssarian.

"
Lakoda had made her preparation and they had given it to the sedated 
Shep Swordson while C'tain helped Mukale set up the cage at the man's 
feet. Then the lad took his spot with his flame thrower aimed and ready.

"You aren't going to blow up my medical center with that thing are you,
son." Asked D'ssarian, eyeing the contraption suspiciously.

"No, sir." Said Mukale. "It's set at it's lowest setting. Almost like a
prod you would use with sheep and cattle."

D'ssarian nodded, then looked at Lakoda who nodded her readiness as well. 

Just as D'ssarian was about to make the first cut, T'rend ran in, with 
a dripping steak which he promptly threw in the cage and grabbed up his
flame-thrower.

D'ssarian raised an eyebrow at the dragonrider. T'rend grinned at the 
older healer, "I told you I'd hurry."

The Tejas drug was working just as Koda said it would, when D'ssarian 
made his first cut. Koda stood by ready to hand the older healer what 
ever instrument he requested. A second cut was made bisecting the first, 
up near the top. Then a third was made towards the bottom and Koda was
helping D'ssarian to pull apart the two side of the severed skin to 
expose the stomach cavity.

The healer cautioned her to keep alert and t be ready to move back out 
of the way in a hurry if there was any indication that the hellspawn 
inside the man was still awake.

Blood covered her gloved hands but the girl took no notice as her 
fingers moved around gently inside the mans body, searching for 
something that wasn't suppost to be there.

"There doesn't appear to be to much deterioration of any vital organ,"
D'ssarian commented. "Hopefully we got to him in time." 
The man kept up a running commentary the whole time, every once in a 
while glancing over at Koda to see how she was holding up.

"The last time we found the thing right about...  here it is!" 
Hesitating for a mere second before asking for a probe, the healer 
used the long handled tool to jab at the inert body of their most hated
enemy. A relieved sigh escaped from his lips when the thing made no movement
or response.

"The drug really worked," he sounded surprised. Koda just smiled as 
she saw T'rend and the younger man, M'kale relax slightly from their
obligation and take a look over her shoulder. 

"But we do have a small problem here," D'ssarian was saying, drawing 
Koda's attention back to the man on the table. "The hellspawn seems 
to have attached itself to several different organs. We're going to 
have to sever each and every one very carefully. It might take us a 
while to do so. Lakoda do you know how long the drug will work to 
keep them in this state?" 

"Usually one dose will last fifteen to twenty minutes in normal use, 
but with this... thing drawing off part of it, I really couldn't say 
for sure." she told him honestly. "If I had to make a guess, I would 
say that we could cut the time in half or maybe a little less. Just 
to be on the safe side maybe we should go ahead and prepare a second 
dose and have it ready in a syringe just in case it's needed."

"Good idea," the healer agreed, talking the scalpel she handed him. 
"just tell C'tain how to prepare it and he can get it ready."

Koda turned her head around to where the other healer stood watching 
and was happy to see a familiar face near the man. "Let Arri show him 
how to prepare it," she said as her eyes met those of the other 
woman's. "If she would. It'll be easier for him to see it done."

(Two hours later)

Those in the room were more that a little relieved when D'ssarian made 
the final cut and the hellspawn was completely severed from it's human host.
All that was left to do was have T'rend and M'kale help transfer 
the thing into the cage they had waiting so that the two healers could start
closing the man up. 

Just as the men were reaching to lift it away from Shep Swordson's body
using specially prepared--  it moved, as if coming awake from it's drug
induce state, causing D'ssarian to jump back quickly, in the process 
the scalpel in his hand slipped slicing through the flesh of his first
finger and the back of his hand.

"Arri, look to D'ssarian's hand, C'tain I need your help here with the
patient," Koda started shouting orders in the tone of one accustom to 
doing so, at the same time she reached for the syringe filled with the 
coma inducing drug and thrust the tip into the sluggish but moving body 
of the hellspawn. Within seconds the drug began to take effect and the
creature was once again rendered harmless. 

"Get this-- thing.. out of here," she felt a shudder rack her body as 
she took her first good look at the thing. "And *please* be quick about 
it.

The two men did just that. Quickly and with little effort the hellspawn 
was transferred into the cage they had ready and waiting. Just as 
uickly, they removed the thing from the room, much to everyone's relief.

With C'tain's help, Koda finished closing up the open incisions, and settled
the man into a room to recover. Only time would tell if what 
they had done here today had worked. Restraints had been placed on the 
mans limbs to keep him from moving around to much, both to keep him 
from tearing the stitches and to keep others safe if the operation 
failed some how. 

After seeing the man to his room, Koda went in search of the injured healer.
She wanted to find out if he was all right and to make sure 
the cut to his hand was nothing serious. She found him in a side room 
with Arri who was just finishing up the last stitch to the back of the man's
hand.

"How's it look?" she asked walking into the room.

"Twenty four stitches all together,"  Arri told her as she began to 
wrap the white colored gauss around the area to keep it clean. 

"And it hurts like hell," D'ssarian snapped irritably, "Did you finish 
up all right?"

"Thanks to C'tain's help," she smiled. "If he hadn't of been there and 
if I wasn't trying to make a good impression on you-- I think I just 
might have wet my pants when that .. thing started to move."

D'ssarian's smiled, "I know what you mean."

Koda gave a short laugh. "Well your man is resting comfortably in room 
six. We should be able to tell by morning if what we did here today was
enough to save his life." She turned then to the other woman.

"Arri it's good to see you again," Koda said warmly, meaning it. "I look
forward to working with you again. Maybe sometime we could get together 
and talk." she looked slyly in the older healer's direction. "That is if
you've decided weather or not I can stay at Marrid."
---------------------------------------------------
(nrpg: Well??? Does she get to stay? *grin*



    ********Submitted by:*********************
             Barbara
    Voices of:
    Warrenlady Jayleigh & Queen Viktroy (Daere)
    Tera & Sundellath (Telnor), 
    Dan'yar & Shinner (Cleft) 
    Shawnee (Whiteriver)
    Lakoda & Ribbon (Marrid)

Daere Warren Home Page
(http://mail.reallink.com/~carolyn/index.html
(Barbara's Pern Question page)
<http://pubpages.unh.edu/~bscott/pern/questions.html>